New Treatment and the Question of More Children

I posted a while back about starting methyl-B12 shots on Sam. We have to get them from a compounding pharmacy ($$$) and give them every other night. The first round went alright. I gave them to Sam after he went to sleep. He would wake briefly with a cry of indignation but them he would go right back to sleep. I noticed that he seemed to sleep better when he got the shots but there didn't seem to be any other effects. I was ready to quit them because of the cost. The doctor talked me into another round. We paired the second round with and addition of folinic acid to Sam's vitamin routine. That week, I got notes from he teacher about how much better his focus seemed. I don't know if that is really enough to draw a conclusion but I think we will continue for a while longer.

Our newest treatment is a series of Homeopathic formulations. The company that makes them is called Guna and Sam gets drops from 6 different bottles a few times a day. We just started so I don't have any clear results. Sam HAS seemmed more focused and social this weke but he is recovering from H1N1 so he might just be tired and in need of some comfort. The jury is still out on this one.

Now to the question so many parents of autistic children agonize over: Should we have more children knowing that there is an increased chance of having a child with developmental delays?

I have always wanted a big family. I always imagined having 4 or 5 children. It never occured to me that I might not be able to. I was never set on having biological children and infact I always envisioned a family of bio and adopted kids). I have been lucky enough have gotten pregnant very easily both times but I was ready to adopt right away if that had not been the case. Now that Maya is becoming more indepedent and seems to be on a normal developmental track, do we roll the dice again? do we look into adoption? International? Foster care?

Mark seems inclined to try again for another biological child. He is not against adopting but he resents the invasiveness of the process (he understands why it must be so but he doesn't look forward to it). He has always been interested in adoption (our niece is adopted) as well but the paperwork puts him off since his work schedule is already so busy. He also doesn't want to commit to an expensive international adotpion which could be a hardship for our current children. He is actually more open to the idea of adopting from foster car if we got that route..

I loved (and hated at times) being pregnant and part of me wants to jump at the chance to go through it again. Another part of me wants to throw our urge for another child into the adoption process. We have had a few conversations about it and we have not resolved the issue. I think we both agree that we want one more (after that we will see) and that we will wait 6 months to a year before we go for it. In the meantime, I am going to research foster-care adoption so we can discuss the facts. I work with someone who did this recently and I am going to try to schedule some talk time with him and his wife.

To all of you out there with children on the spectrum: What decision did you make about having more kids? What factored into your decision?

Sam was too sick to trick-or-treat (not that he knew what he was missing) but not too sick for a lollipop.

I wasn't going to dress Maya up (I was feeling cheap) but I found a hand-me-down costume in the attic and I am glad I did. She had a great time beeing a bumble bee.